Purpose
Why the work we do together matters.
The big picture
It’s so easy to get caught up in activities and processes that we sometimes forget the big picture. This student needs an internship right away, so we set something up without thinking about its role in the student’s career journey or the employer’s talent strategy. Thinking about purpose helps us step back and make sure all of our actions are intentional and result in real change.
Industry and our education systems are facing significant challenges going forward – challenges that can only be met by working together based on their shared interests. Roundhouse was created to help K-12 education, postsecondary education, and industry connect and build partnerships that create an outsized impact on student and workforce outcomes. We focus on the following areas:
Establish a big vision
While there are exceptions, many industry/education partnerships tend to be poorly defined, narrowly focused, and tactical in nature. Industry partners join a CTE program and do what they’re asked, such as serving as guest speakers, hosting internships, or sitting on advisory boards. While these are important roles, they leave a lot on the table: A chance to define and work towards the outcomes that the partners really want to achieve.
We want to help you build a big vison for the things that matter. Let’s define what a great entry-level candidate looks like for industry and how your partners can help you develop those students with a full work-based learning scope and sequence and an active, substantive advisory board that focused on program relevance and resource requirements.
Define and measure ROI
One of the greatest challenges to industry/education partnerships is the fact that there is no real sense of a return on investment, or ROI. This is the single greatest barrier to industry involvement; it is also one of the main reasons for a lack of investment in partnerships on the part of schools.
It is past time that we ask and answer the kinds of questions that allow both sides to define their outcomes and justify their investment in partnerships. For schools, how are student outcomes changing as a result of industry support? For industry, what impact is their partnership work having on their workforce needs, and in fact on their business today? Defining and tracking ROI has tremendous potential to exponentially grow the level of partnership activity we see, changing partnership work from a “nice to have” into a “have to have.”
Create a true partnership of equals
Industry and education are very different worlds, with their own ways of doing things and even the language they use. In a strong partnership, each partner understands how the other’s world works, what is important to them, how to communicate effectively in that other world, and the value that each partner brings to the table. They also understand that every partner in an effort needs to see a return, so they build relationships that reflect the priorities of everyone involved.
Build excellent partnership activities
Every interaction between employers and students, and between employers and educators for that matter, should be purposeful and impactful. There are effective models for everything from guest speaking to hosting internships to serving on advisory boards. Our goal is to make every touchpoint between stakeholders to be valuable, which we do via professional trainings and written guides.